Healthy teeth let you look and feel good, eat and speak properly — and good oral health is important to your overall well-being. These are the everyday services that keep problems from ever starting: cleanings, fillings, sealants, gum care, and careful diagnostics.
Maintaining good oral hygiene is one of the most important things you can do for your teeth and gums. Daily preventive care — proper brushing and flossing — helps stop problems before they develop, and it is far less costly and far more comfortable than treating conditions that have been allowed to progress.
At your visits we reinforce that daily work with professional cleanings and exams, so that anything your toothbrush misses gets caught early.
A filling removes decay and replaces the affected tooth structure — new material literally fills the hole that decay left behind. Today, most teeth are treated with bonded, tooth-colored composite resin fillings, so the repair disappears into the tooth.
Caught early enough, cavities can be treated easily and painlessly. Left untreated, decay can lead to tooth pain or infection, and the tooth may then need root canal treatment or extraction. This is the whole argument for regular checkups in one sentence.
Some teeth have fine grooves or pits that accumulate plaque — not because you don't brush, but because they are too narrow to admit even a single bristle. Over time those grooves develop cavities. A sealant is a coating brushed onto the tooth that seals the grooves and pits, so plaque can be brushed away and the tooth stays healthy. It is a simple, painless visit, and especially valuable for protecting children's teeth from decay.
X-rays are a necessary part of diagnosis: without an image of the whole tooth and its supporting bone and gum tissue, there is no real way to detect infection or pathology that needs attention. Not using them can mean undiagnosed disease.
In our office we use digital radiography, which takes X-rays using 50 to 70 percent less radiation than conventional film X-rays. Coupled with computer monitoring, the digital images can be enhanced on screen for a better diagnosis of any dental concern.
In addition to digital radiography, we use the Diagnodent — a portable laser — and the Spectra fluorescence system. These are the latest tools for detecting caries, the early decay that leads to cavities, often before anything is visible to the eye. Earlier detection means smaller fillings, or none at all.
Bonding adheres composite resin — matched to the color of your tooth — to the front of the tooth. It repairs damage from decay, alters the alignment of a tooth, closes gaps, or simply improves how a tooth looks. The whole process happens in one visit.
The surface of the tooth is gently roughened so it can accept the bonding material and hold it.
A gel micro-etches the tooth surface, and a primer and bonding agent are applied so the resin adheres securely.
The color-matched composite resin is placed on the tooth and hardened with an intense light.
As the last step, the material is shaped and polished to a lustrous, natural finish.
The gums, ligaments, and bone around your teeth — the periodontium — are the foundation your teeth stand on. When that foundation is unhealthy, it jeopardizes the teeth just as a bad foundation threatens the stability of a house. Any of these signs may mean something is wrong.
With proper care, it may be possible to return your gums to a healthy state. Treatment usually involves a deep cleaning or root planing done under a local anesthetic, with the use of the latest state-of-the-art laser technology, along with local antibiotic agents. If gum disease becomes too severe, it may need to be treated through surgery or extraction — which is exactly why it is important to come in at the first sign of a problem. If something on this list sounds familiar, come see us so we can take care of it right away.
One doctor, one office on Summer Street, and a front desk that answers. Call and we will find a time that works.